The unarmed man killed Tuesday by Denver police was a gang member who got advice on how to rob a bank from a fellow gang member who once worked as teller, according to an arrest warrant.

Dion Ray Damon, 40, was known as “Stryke” by fellow Gallant Knights Insane gang members, according to the arrest warrant affidavit obtained by The Denver Post.

Damon had been wanted in connection with the March 17 robbery of the Bank of Denver on the 500 block of South Holly Street when he was shot and killed Tuesday in downtown by a Denver Police Department officer working with the Rocky Mountain Safe Streets Task Force.

The warrant was based on witness descriptions of the bank robber, an anonymous tip and then statements made to the Denver Police Department’s gang unit on April 8 when another GKI member was arrested on a weapon possession charge during a traffic stop.

The bank robber had used a small, black handgun to threaten three tellers, the warrant said. The robber ordered them to fill a plastic grocery bag with money.

Once the tellers had handed over the money, the robber ordered them lie on the floor. He left the bank, and one teller ran to lock the door and to get the getaway car’s license plate number.

Detectives found the getaway car four days after the robbery, but it had been reported stolen to the Sheridan Police Department.

On March 21, a Denver gang unit detective received an anonymous tip that identified Damon as the bank robber, the warrant said. Detectives with the safe streets task force ran computer searches and identified Damon as “Stryke” and as having a similar height and weight as the robber.

Then, the other GKI gang member was picked up and agreed to tell detectives about the robbery. That gang member’s name was redacted from the police arrest warrant.

The GKI member said he had loaned Damon his handgun and had answered Damon’s questions about procedures the Bank of Denver uses during a robbery, the warrant said. He also said he gave details about teller stations.

He also “told Dion about the 2010 robbery in which he had been a victim teller,” the arrest warrant said.

On the day of the robbery, Damon picked up his fellow gang member, saying he wanted to “check some things out at the bank,” the warrant said.

Damon then put on pair of dark-framed glasses and went inside. He came back with a grocery sack of money and told the other man to drive. They ditched the stolen car a few blocks from the bank and got inside Damon’s silver Dodge Charger and went home.

Damon did not share money from the robbery, the warrant said.

Damon’s family did not know about the bank robbery or that a warrant had been issued, Barrientos said.

Barrientos also said his brother was not in a gang and was not a violent person. He mostly stayed at home and occasionally worked with Barrientos, who is a painter.

“That’s not Dion,” he said. “They’re just trying to paint a picture of him. That’s not what the truth is.”

Damon served a short prison sentence on a criminal extortion conviction in 1998, according to Colorado Bureau of Investigation records.

“I can’t see my brother robbing a bank,” Barrientos said. “He hadn’t had problems in a long time.”

A Denver SWAT unit member, Tech. Jeff Motz, fired seven shots at Damon Tuesday during a standoff on the 1300 block of Bannock Street near the Denver Art Museum and Civic Center Park.

Police said Damon ignored orders to get out of his car for nearly one minute before making a “threatening-type maneuver.”

Damon’s partner and her son had been in the car before police surrounded them.

The shooting has generated criticism from community activists because Damon did not have a gun and because police conducted a potentially dangerous operation during the lunch hour in a busy part of Denver.

Noelle Phillips, a Nashville native and a Western Kentucky University journalism school grad, covers law enforcement and public safety for The Denver Post. She has spent more than 20 years in the newspaper world. During that time, she's covered everything from rural towns in the Southeast to combat in the Middle East. The Denver Post is her fifth newspaper and her first in the West.

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